Standoff closes Dallas-area federal offices, parks, much more

2/17

Mark Wilson/Getty Images

A U.S. Park Police officer uses police tape to close the Lincoln Memorial, October 1, 2013 in Washington, DC. The National Mall and all monuments and large sections of the government will close due to government shut down after Congress failed to agree on spending.

The federal government shutdown arrived Tuesday, keeping thousands of North Texas federal workers at home with no idea of when the next paycheck will arrive.

For many residents, it had little or no direct effect. But for others, it could be felt in the form of closed campgrounds and parks, shuttered federal offices and lack of access to federal agency websites and toll-free information lines.

The federal courts will remain open for at least 10 more business days. And agencies that conduct criminal investigations like the FBI remained largely intact. Other federal workers continued to control air traffic and screen air travelers.

But Federal Aviation Administration inspectors who normally keep close tabs on everything from airplane maintenance to pilot performance have been sent home. The shutdown also halted the federal investigation of the West Fertilizer plant explosion by the Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board.

Sarah Saldaña, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Texas, said a little less than half of her employees were at home, including civil division lawyers, legal assistants and most administrative staff. The rest, including herself and criminal prosecutors, are considered essential but are “working for free,” she said.

“It’s just a crazy thing to ask of employees of the United States,” she said.

Texas has about 135,000 federal workers.

Most federal civil cases involving the government have been delayed while the standoff continues in Washington, Saldaña said, but criminal cases are a priority. The Dallas FBI office will not be affected by furloughs and will be able to continue working on criminal investigations.

U.S. District Chief Judge Sidney Fitzwater, who is presiding over the insider trading case of Mark Cuban, said it was business as usual in the courts in the Northern District. But if 10 more business days elapse without any budget agreement in Washington, “we will encounter a very difficult scenario that we hope we don’t have to face,” he said.

Jason Hawkins, the federal public defender for the Northern District of Texas, said the budget impasse “adds a whole new layer of stupidity to our situation” that he said began with the automatic cuts.

Hawkins said he’s already lost five employees to mandatory cuts, including his predecessor, who decided to retire early to lessen the effect on the office. The other losses include two veteran investigators and two young attorneys who could no longer afford the furlough and decided to go into private practice, he said.

“I’m barely getting by with the people I’ve got left,” Hawkins said.

Dallas federal court clerk Karen Mitchell said no checks for court-appointed attorneys are going out until funding is available.

Mitchell said that many attorneys are committed to “doing the right thing” and that the bigger concern is being able to pay experts such as forensic accountants who are needed for trials in complex financial cases. Mitchell said payments to jurors also could be delayed if funding is not in place by Oct. 15.

Camping, fishing

The Fort Worth district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said it was closing all parks and campgrounds it operates. Campers already on the grounds will have to leave by 8 p.m. Wednesday but can get partial refunds. They also can opt to use their reservations for a later date.

Among the closings were campsites, fishing spots and boat ramps around the 25 lakes the corps manages, including Grapevine, Joe Pool, Lavon and Lewisville lakes.

Boaters will still be able to access the water — provided they don’t use corps marinas. But no one can fish at the lakeside parks or set up their RVs at the campsites.

Jim McDougall, one of a handful of campers at Elm Creek Park at Lavon Lake, was unsure where he’d go next as he packed up Tuesday.

McDougal spent years in airports as an agent for American Airlines. When he retired seven years ago, he decided to see the country from the ground. He and his wife sold their house and lived on the road, stopping for weeks at place like Yellowstone National Park and the Grand Canyon, which are now closed.

“There is a whole subculture on the road that travels around like we do,” he said.

The shutdown will make life difficult for that group, he said. Until Tuesday, he’d planned to stay at Lavon Lake for another couple of weeks. Now, he’s struggling to find his next stop.

“I am madder than hell,” he said. “It has gone beyond distrust in our so-called leaders. I can’t believe they have lost the ability to even negotiate.”

Bush Library

The state’s nine national parks and three presidential libraries are closed until Congress reaches an agreement. A steady trickle of tourists approached the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum at Southern Methodist University on Tuesday only to find a mostly desolate courtyard and closed doors.

The Bush Library, part of the George W. Bush Presidential Center, was built by the privately funded George W. Bush Foundation. But it was handed over to the National Archives and Records Administration before it opened to the public in May.

Those ties to the government mean the Bush Library is feeling the effect of the federal shutdown. Visitors, even those who traveled long distances to see the history of the 43rd presidency, are being turned away.

Alberta Veenstra, 84, flew from Illinois to tour the Bush Library with her son, Paul, who lives in Plano. It wasn’t until Paul Veenstra received a phone call from a friend — just as he and his mother parked at the center — that they heard about the closure.

The elder Veenstra said she doesn’t know when she’ll get another chance to see the library. “Its kind of a gyp that you can’t get in,” she said.

Other parts of the Bush Center still operated by the Bush Foundation, such as the George W. Bush Institute, a policy think tank, aren’t affected by the shutdown and remained open.

FAA staff

At airports in North Texas and across the country, FAA inspectors were not at work. Robert Jackson, who works for the FAA in Phoenix, said he and his colleagues make sure airplanes are fit to fly.

“Imagine it this way,” he said. “You’re driving from Dallas to Oklahoma City on Interstate 35, and suddenly it’s announced that both Texas and Oklahoma have laid off all of their police officers. How fast do you think you’d drive?”

His supervisor, Pete Yiakos, said it’s not quite as bad as that.

“The airlines have safety systems built in, and they have reports that they must file and procedures for how to report something that goes wrong,” he said. “It’s not really that they have a free pass.”

Yiakos was the only person from the office working Tuesday. “Whether I get paid for my time here is not yet known,” he said. “There’s a lot that’s not yet known. We’re only into the first day of this.”

Local programs

Local governments and agencies that depend on federal dollars, from YMCAs to health departments to Head Start programs, prepared for the worst.

Because Head Start of Greater Dallas is in the middle of its fiscal year, the thousands of children the program serves will not lose any services right now, said Kenneth Gilbert, chief executive of the nonprofit. But if the government remains shut down for months, he said, the office would have to close its doors.

Zachary Thompson, Dallas County’s health and human services director, said his department runs programs that rely on federal dollars. If the shutdown stretches into November, he said, he could have problems getting reimbursed for money spent on federally funded programs this month.

To post a comment, log into your chosen social network and then add your comment below. Your comments are subject to our Terms of Service and the privacy policy and terms of service of your social network. If you do not want to comment with a social network, please consider writing a letter to the editor.